Sweet potatoes can be prepared exactly as you would prepare regular white potatoes, though the flavor will be considerably different–richer and sweeter. In salads, as fries, mashed, sautéed, boiled, steamed, or however you choose to prepare them, sweet potatoes add a sweet earthy flavor to any dish.

I also use them in recipes just as I would squash or pumpkin. Their sweetness makes them ideal for desserts as well as savory dishes. The classic sweet potato pie is a good example. In the recipe below, I’ve used a favorite German potato salad recipe and adapted it to use sweet potatoes instead. Continue Reading

Simplicity itself in terms of preparation, this colorful slaw salad has spectacular flavors. It makes a unique summer picnic or potluck dish. The overall effect on the palate is light and refreshing. It’s a wonderful way to try a couple of ingredients you may not have used before–daikon radishes and fennel bulb. The carrots make this look attractive, even to kids. Continue Reading

I’ve been creating locavore recipes on this web site for nearly two-and-a-half years now. This is the 138th recipe I’ve posted. I think I can honestly say this is one of the top three best in terms of flavor. Since I first prepared this salad, we’ve been having it at least once, and sometimes twice, a week. It’s taste is addictive! Continue Reading

It was the last Farmers Market of 2011, and I was looking for an ingredient to make a festive, end of the year dish which would be both a flavorful and a visual end-of-season celebration. I found exactly what I needed at Alm Hill Gardens–chioggia (pronounced “kee-OH-jee-ah”) beets. Continue Reading

A couple of months ago when I was harvesting the last produce from my home garden, I brought in a cabbage which weighed ten pounds after I had removed the outer leaves and cleaned it up. Since this was about the third head of cabbage that size I’d had to deal with, not to mention a half dozen heads of more normal size, I decided it was time to learn to make sauerkraut. That way I could spread out eating the cabbage over several months. As it turned out, making sauerkraut is pretty simple. Continue Reading

Recently a friend called me and asked if I’d like a big batch of broccoli stems. She was freezing broccoli from her garden, and usually purees the stems to use for soups, but didn’t have room this year in her freezer. “Sure!” I said, and the next morning a big bag of stalks was on my doorstep.

For some people it’s weird, I know. Broccoli stems are often seen as trimmings, and discarded. I really like the flavor, though. I think stems taste sweeter and less bitter than the florets. They also don’t have the grainy floret texture that children and others sometimes find objectionable. Continue Reading

Spring is a time when I begin to crave salads. In the winter, few (if any) fresh locally grown greens are available, so when early spring greens become available it’s an exciting time for locavore dining!

This salad is a combination of freshly harvested foods and ingredients preserved from last year’s harvest. It showcases the tastes of this transitional time of year. Continue Reading

My personal favorite pickled food is pickled beet eggs. As a child, when my grandmother opened a jar of her pickled beets, she would remove beets to serve and then fill the jar space with peeled hard boiled eggs. By the next day, when we sliced the eggs open, the colors were gorgeous! The egg whites were deep purple on the outside, shading to white around the bright yellow yolks (see photo). Beautiful! The flavor was delightful, too–the tang of pickled beets balanced with the mild taste of hard-boiled eggs. Perfect!

As soon as I spotted the first fresh beets at the Farmers Market this year, I was eager to get them home and into pickling juice as quickly as possible. Because I planned to eat them in the next few days, I used a “refrigerator pickle” recipe. Continue Reading

At my local Farmers Market last weekend, Nettles Farm (Lummi Island) had three varieties of beans available–green beans, wax beans, and my favorite Dragon’s Tongue beans. Wax beans are like green beans, but the pod is a pale yellow color. Dragon’s Tongue beans have yellow-green pods with dark maroon patches all over (see a few beside the bowl in the photo on this page). They’re quite lovely! Continue Reading

My daughter’s employer is a farmer at heart, and was able to make time to grow a vegetable garden this year. He recently had more red cabbage than he could use, so passed some along to us. Continue Reading